Phase 4: Heart of a Band
by Earthstar-the-fungus
Summary: One by one, they slip away. Now Noodle must cope with the death of her family.
1. The beginning of the end

**The Beginning of the End**

"Where's 2D!" Murdoc yelled, rather than asked the question. "He was supposed to be here an hour ago!" The Satanist jumped off his stool and paced around the jerry-rigged recording studio in the basement of their apartment. The Gorillaz, after being reunited at long last, were doing what they did best: making music. Or they would have if the singer would finally show up.

"I haven't seen 'D all day," Russel said, absentmindedly fiddling with a slider.

"He did not come down for breakfast," added Noodle. She was glad to be recording music with her family again, but she always forgot how dysfunctional they were.

"Well, I'll tear him a new hole! Making me wake up at noon." Murdoc stomped upstairs in the flat they all shared, too worked up to take the disabled lift. From upstairs, Noodle could hear yelling and banging noises, culminating in a series of thuds. 2D bounced down the stairs, landing in a disheveled heap at the bottom.

Something about how the body settled at the bottom made Noodle uneasy.

"Yo, 'D, you all right?" Russel reached out his massive paws and set 2D on his feet. But he simply flopped down again, like a puppet with cut strings.

"'D?"

Noodle had seen bodies that fell like that before. Back a long time ago, when many bad memories were made. With a sickening intuition, she bent down and held 2D's wrist between her fingers.

"Ohh, my knees-," Murdoc muttered as he appeared down the stairs, only to be roughly lifted up by Russel.

"Muds, did you go and break 2D's spine! He ain't moving an inch."

"He has no pulse." Noodle's verdict chilled the room.

"You can't be serious. Murdoc, you've gone too far-"

"He's stiff, and cold. He's been dead for a while."

"He's really ..." Russel dropped Murdoc, his white eyes wide.

They stared at 2D's corpse on the ground. That still, Noodle could see how thin his wrists were. Fragile. Like bird bones. Like an awkward crane stalking the rice fields. Think about the crane. Not the death-bruised shoulders, blood pooling when it no longer moved. Purple and soft like bruised plum. Yes. Think about the plum. Don't think about anything else.

Murdoc stood up business-like, jerking Noodle from her spasmodic thoughts. "Right then, I'll need five white candles, a piece of chalk, Russel, grab the TV will ya?"

"What kinda bullshit are you trying to pull?"

Murdoc smiled with all his teeth. It stretched across his face awkwardly, like putty, Noodle thought. "If there's anyone among us that's an expert in dead souls, it would be me, yeah?"

With haste, Murdoc made the preparations for his otherworldly ritual. They'd cleared away a space on the wood floor and placed a clunky old TV with a broken antenna against the wall. Around the curled-up corpse of 2D, he drew a pentagram on the floor and lighted a candle at each point. He lit a whole box of cigarettes, along with a few wisps of blue hair, and stuck it in a bowl by way of incense. The fumes were choking.

The air was becoming heavier, filled with a presence more than their smoke. Noodle could feel her hair prickle with electricity. Each breath felt like it was dragged through syrup.

Finally, Murdoc took off his inverted cross and hung it on the TV's antennas. His chanting voice picked up an unearthly resonance, as if thousands of muted spirits were chanting along.

"Azaz, agasp, agog, agape. Spirits of the dark realm, hear my voice and obey. I call upon thee to deliver me the voice of the dead. Sashka, mudrah, alacrity."

Despite being unplugged, the TV picked up static, and then coalesced upon the image of a red-skinned lady in a business suit. In a cool, professional voice, she said,

"This is your operator speaking. Who are you trying to reach?"

"Stuart Pot. Stu-pot. 2D."

"One moment please." The demonic operator closed her eyes.

"That will be one long distance call to Heaven. How would you like to pay?"

"Err, put it on my tab."

"Of course, Mr. Niccals."

The TV cut to what seemed to be a wide, sunny field, in which 2D was sitting vacantly. His eyes closed, he looked to be just soaking up the sun.

"Helloooo, Earth to Dents!"

The blue-haired man noticed the call and bounded over. When his face filled his screen, Noodle saw that his eyes were no longer black holes, but had normal pupils in normal whites.

"Hello Muds! What are you doing in this puddle?" His beaming smile revealed the presence of two undamaged front teeth.

"What are you doing, dying without my permission!"

"Huh? I'm dead?"

"Where do you think you are, denthead, Narnia?"

"Oh, so that's what happened. That does explain the angels."

"How could you not even realize you've died!"

"Well, all I remember is taking a load of pills, going to bed, and then waking up here. I thought it was a dream or something."

"Just come back here. We're missing you already." Murdoc said in his most cloying voice, the same one he used to try and convince girls into his Winnebago. "All you have to do is say the magic words, and we'll stick you back in your body, good as new. You'll be like one of those zombies you've always liked, huh?" Murdoc gave a winsome smile, if sharks could be winsome.

2D pouted. "No. I'm not going back."

Murdoc's expression switched abruptly as a record scratch.

"What! I own your soul! Some people would kill for just another day of life, and here I am, offering you eternity! You ungrateful little dolt."

"I like it up here. It's nice and nothing hurts anymore. And I don't have to worry about you pushing me around all day."

Murdoc hooked in Noodle and pushed her to the screen. "C'mon, don't be selfish. Think of all the people you're leaving behind. Don't you see how sad Noodle is?"

Noodle looked at the limp, curled up body in front of her, and the beatific spirit on the TV, and her heart gave a funny little twinge.

"No, no, don't cry Noods. I can come back. I'll be fine," 2D warbled.

"No," Noodle sniffed. "It's not right. You should be where you're happy."

"Noodle is right," Russel said. "Once the reaper gets you, your time is up."

"Fine, be a bunch of sentimental pansies. I'm coming up there to drag you back myself."

The operator's voice came back on line. "I apologize for breaking up this touching reunion, but it seems your account is out of order, Mr. Niccals. This call will be charged collect."

2D screamed and clutched his face. His high-pitched voice was the sound of a soul being ripped apart. His eyes exploded, a shock of red running through his fingers. The gelatinous viscera ran through his fingers, leaving black hollows behind.

"Stop the call!" Noodle tore the cross pendant from the antenna.

The screen went black.

* * *

Thousands of people attended 2D's funeral, including not a few illegitimate children. Murdoc hooked up the whole thing to webcam, so fans from Armenia to Australia could pay their respects. Always the opportunist, he came up with a scheme of selling blue hair dye to grieving fans "et memoriam."

The coroner had found evidence of a bruised rib cage, mysteriously scrambled organs, and permanent brain trauma in Stuart's system, along with a copious amount of various painkillers in his system. Noodle noticed Murdoc passing a large sum of money for the doctor not to suspect foul play.

To others, the body would have looked as peaceful as sleep. The mortician was talented. But Noodle knew the dead. It rankled at her, the things that were off. No breath, no blush. No movement, no sound. She knew better.

Perhaps the knowledge that 2D's soul was still preserved in some form should have comforted her. Yet it did not.

Without their singer, the band was like a Geep with three wheels, all pulling in separate directions. While Russel upped his prescription aripiprazole, and Noodle helped 2D's parents get his estate in order ("How many child support payments!?"), Murdoc scrounged through 2D's most prized possessions for things he could hawk to desperate fans. About two weeks after the funeral, Murdoc disappeared abruptly, then came back a week later with a large suitcase. ("You wouldn't believe the trouble I had getting this through customs.")

Murdoc had gone all the way to Japan to "forcibly invite" one of the Japanese vocaloids, the blue-haired one, to be the new lead singer. ("You dumbass, you're disrespecting the fans." "All we need is a pretty face to put on the packaging, and they'll eat it up.") Noodle disliked it immediately. It had all of the stupidity, and none of the charm or lyrical talent of the original. It's constant simpering affection towards its programmed "master" Murdoc and whining after ice cream made her want to kick it in the face. Which she did, on several occasions, but that never left a dent in its metallic skull.

When Murdoc announced a farewell concert for 2D's death, she'd had it with his money-grubbing attitude. She would have nothing to do with this scheme. Russel agreed, and literally kicked him out of the flat. ("We can still be the Gorillaz! We'll just put 2D's face on a screen, use some fancy CGI. It'll be just like he's still alive.")

The two were vindicated when the "2D Memorial World Tour" was a resounding failure. Since neither the guitarist, nor the drummer was coming along, it turned into Cyborg Noodle, Vocaloid Kaito, and a drum machine. A mechanical chorus of robots.

Between mechanical malfunctions, Murdoc's chronic lack of sobriety, and the surprise visit the rest of the Vocaloids paid the concert to rescue their brother, critics panned the show as "A gross abomination of emotional exploitation", "not worth the ticket price" and "derivative and played-out."

Noodle followed the growing catastrophe with masochistic fascination. On television, she could see Murdoc growing more and more haggard as he tried to play damage control. ("Look, everything I did was for the music.") He was indeed looking his age more and more.

In the end, it was too much for one man to hold together. After the last concert, Murdoc disappeared for parts unknown, not even sitting for a final interview. There was nothing left of him but debts.

As the dirigible of the Gorillaz machine went up in flames, Noodle felt vindicated, in a hollow way, but mostly angry. Her moods swung like an unbalanced metronome. One day, she was full of nervous energy, visiting the local Neo-Nazi rally to collect samples. The next day, she threw them all out, smashing the CD's. Exhausted, she lay on the couch and diffidently plucked her guitar. Upstairs, the neighbor's radio played a medley of pop hits of yesteryear.

"Windmill, windmill, for the land-"

Noodle pulled out a gun and shot right at the heart of the noise. The radio went silent.

"Don't do that, baby girl, you'll give me a heart attack."

Russel, never one on the right side of sanity, was having a hard time keeping it together. He was constantly mumbling under his breath, whether a rap, or a prayer, Noodle couldn't tell. One day, he went out, said he was going out for groceries. He never returned.

Noodle filed a missing person report with the police, but she didn't go searching for him. She didn't call out from the rooftops. She didn't pull all her connections. She didn't make a cry for help online, where people might have listened.

She was too tired.


	2. Timeskip

**A new beginning**

Noodle futzed around in the kitchen, putting the last touches on dinner. Roast chicken, new peas, mashed potatoes. She thought she was finally getting the hang of western cooking. It was simple, really, once you had a recipe, and instructions to follow exactly.

She was considering the possibility of making a pan gravy from the chicken drippings when the buzzer sounded.

That was strange. They weren't expecting dinner guests. And a solicitor would have a hard time bypassing security.

"Who is it?" she asked through the speaker.

"It's me, love. Let me in, it's pouring." She could recognize that Stoke-On-Trent accent even through the static of the speaker.

How could he have found her? Noodle thought she had expunged all traces of her past. She had a new house, a new job, and a perfectly banal, ordinary, normal life. She hadn't been in the news for years.

Now, a ghost from the past was haunting her front door.

"You've got a lot of nerve showing up here, Murdoc" said Noodle, feet planted firmly under the awning.

"Aww, aren't you even going to say hello?"

Noodle couldn't believe her eyes at the cellshaded figure in front of her. The Satanist looked like an alley cat that had gotten in a fight with a trash compactor. And from the looks of things, Murdoc couldn't believe his eyes either, Noodle in a nice blouse and work-appropriate skirt.

"Where have you been all these years?"

"Here and there. Been kicking around in Thailand for a bit. Lovely girls, although you really have to check the goods before you buy, heh heh." His chuckle devolved into a coughing fit, which left him bent over and wheezing.

Looks like some things never change. Noodle hazarded a guess that he'd blown through all his money getting blown by cheap tarts. She gave him her most disapproving look.

As Murdoc raised a cigarette up to his mouth, she noticed something off. She grabbed his hand.

"Murdoc, what happened?"

"Oh, this? It's nothing, really. Just got into a little trouble with the local gangs. Apparently, they don't like having the bad English on their tattoos pointed out. Anyway, it's fine. All the great cartoon stars have four fingers." He nonchalantly placed his pinkie-less left hand in his pocket. "But yeah, I think I'm done traveling for now. Think I'll settle down for a bit, scope out the old digs, you know. You wouldn't happen to have a spare couch, would you?"

Still holding his hand, Noodle inspected it, looking for any signs of broken bones or bamboo slivers jammed under the fingertips. What sort of trouble had Murdoc gotten into this time?

A hand clapped her shoulder, startling her. She resisted the impulse to throw the person over her shoulder.

"Sweetie, you were gone a while so I got worried. Who's this?"

"Yes, who is this quadrilinear dolt? Your boyfriend?"

"Murdoc, meet David White. My fiancee."

"Oh. You could do much better than that."

"And David, meet Murdoc Niccals, an old … friend of mine."

"Charmed," the clean-shaven man said in a voice that clearly said otherwise.

"Hello Dave, do you mind if I call you that? Me and Noods here go way back. She was part of the band Gorillaz, you know."

"Never heard of them."

"Never heard of- Have you been living under a rock! We're only the greatest band to ever hit the top of the charts. Feel Good, Inc? Clint Eastwood? Any of that ringing a bell?"

David pointedly ignored the fuming Satanist. "Noodle, I didn't know you were part of a band."

"It was a long time ago."

"Sure, just deny your adoptive family like that. Anyway, I just need a place to crash for a couple of days."

Noodle's fiancee was clearly looking a bit put out at the thought of a green, bum-looking man staying in their manicured house. He looked to Noodle for advice.

"Fine. Under three conditions: No smoking. No inviting women over to have sex. And no music. I don't want to hear a single note from you, you understand?"

"I swear on my mother's grave."

"You have no idea who your mother is."

"Fine then, I swear on my father's grave."

* * *

Dinner that night was particularly awkward.

"Nice place you've got here," Murdoc said, talking with his mouth full. "What are you doing nowadays?"

"I'm a clerk."

"Yes, I helped her get a position at Barclays," David added. "You should have seen her first day on the job. It was like she'd never done algebra before. But my girl pulled through."

"And I thought I blew through money like a cheap burrito through a gastrointestinal tract, but this takes the cake. You spent all your millions and had to get a desk job?"

"Millions?" David asked. "When I met you, you were still living in that dinky little flat down in Essex."

Noodle calmly kicked Murdoc under the table. "Murdoc is exaggerating, as usual," she lied. "I did have a sum I inherited from the untimely death of my family. But I would rather earn my own living, and not remain dependent upon the past."

"Understandable. So, Mr. Niccals, what do you do?" Noodle prayed that Murdoc would know when to keep his mouth shut.

"I've done a lot of things over the years. Gravedigging, arms-dealing, stripping lead from church roofs. But, I'd say my biggest role was the bassist of the world-famous Gorillaz. You know, I'm surprised Noodle hasn't told you more about us. She was the guitarist after all."

Of course. Murdoc would never respond to a plea to heaven.

"Those days are long past. I would rather not talk about it."

David picked up on the opportunity to change the subject of the conversation.

"Let me tell you what Deborah in sales said to me the other day ..."

* * *

The next day, Noodle was returning home after a long day of pencil-pushing, coffee-fetching, and paperwork. She just wanted to relax and think of nothing at all. Perhaps TV would help.

However, even two floors away on the lift, Noodle could hear the off-key sound of Murdoc singing. Vibrations of the bass resonated through the elevator like a growling from hell.

"Up on Melancholy Hill there's a plastic tree, are you here with meeeeeee-"

"Oh wow, that's so uber! I love retro pop," a bubbly voice added.

Noodle's blood was boiling as she flung open the door. A haze of cigarette smoke did nothing to hide the incriminating sight of Murdoc plucking the bass for a girl who looked barely out of Comprehensive.

"Out! Get out!" Noodle grabbed the girl by the arm and bodily flung her out the door.

"You have my number, call whenever!" Murdoc yelled after the rapidly-fleeing girl.

"And as for you," Noodle turned on Murdoc.

"Let's not do anything hasty," Murdoc added fearfully.

"You deliberately broke all the rules! I should just defenestrate you right now!"

"Christ-I mean Satan. I thought all that was for your boy toy. Do you really not listen to music anymore?"

"I told you, I don't want to live in the past."

"Music? Living in the past? More like creating the future! You love making music. It's what you were made to do, literally. Don't tell me you don't feel anything when you listen to this." He began playing the beginning of "Double Bass."

All Noodle could hear was Russel bragging about his amazing find of the thought-recording microphone from Tandy, and 2D complaining that the suckerpad was cold against the side of his head. She couldn't listen to any of their music without being bombarded by memories of the past.

The radio was a minefield of musical memories. Every time she heard a particular beat, she could recall the exact series of buttons on the Hip Hop Machine that would recreate it. Restaurants were hellish too, which was why she had stopped going out.

Tears welled in her eyes.

Surprised, Murdoc weakly tried to crack a joke. "Oh, uhh, don't cry. I might be out of practice, but I'm not that bad."

With a cry of frustration, she whipped the bass out of his hands, and pinned him to the wall with the V-shaped bottom.

"No, no, you'll damage the finish!"

"I should just kill you right now."

"Okay, you've had a long day, and you just need to relax. Take deep breaths."

Noodle gritted her teeth through the frankly unprofessional attack of emotion. "You killed 2D."

"What the hell do you mean by that?"

"If you hadn't met him, he'd still be alive. I'm sure of it. Don't think I didn't know about your mind games. Why did he take enough painkillers to put a bull elephant to sleep? Because of the headaches you caused."

"Sure, he might have been alive and married to some rubbish bird. He might even have been happy. No, I'm sure he would have been happy. But his voice would be completely wasted on lulling his brats to sleep. Without my help, he could never have put out four albums, banged all those birds, and gotten all the cocaine he could stuff in his grubby little nostrils."

"So you're saying that his life was a valid sacrifice for art?"

"I'm saying that there's more to life than just breathing. I mean, I look at you, and I see a woman who's completely given up on life. What do you do all day, go to meetings? File papers?"

"I chose this life so I wouldn't have to wallow in the Gorillaz memories all day. I realized that normal people don't have posters of their own face plastered on the walls all day. Don't you ever get sick of hearing your own voice?"

"Not really, no. But I'd certainly like to hear yours with more singing and less yelling."

"I don't do that anymore."

"Honey, I'm home!" David's arrival caught Noodle and Murdoc in a compromising position: Noodle straddling Murdoc's body to pin his neck to the wall.

"Am I interrupting something?"

"No, nothing important," Noodle replied. "Shall I loosen your tie?" That was merely a pretense to go into the bedroom, and a precursor to more interesting activities.

They were very loud. Noodle childishly wished Murdoc heard them and got a case of blue balls so bad, testicles rotted.

* * *

Murdoc lingered on in their house like a bad hangover. The place had been quiet formerly, but now rang with the odd burst of profanity, the clinking of bottles, and hungover snoring. Despite his promises, Noodle could smell the tell-tale scent of cigarettes, and hear Murdoc humming tunelessly. He'd even been feeling up some uber-chic teenager until Noodle had kicked them out. But somehow, Murdoc found his way back on the couch, which started taking on a distinctive odor. At least, there weren't any webcams this time.

Lacking a stable profession, Murdoc took on a variety of odd jobs. His attempt to donate to a sperm bank ended in a long rant about absurd standards. ("What, isn't being musical god good enough for them? But no, they have a blasted height requirement!") There was some success in stand-up comedy, up until he threw a microphone at a heckler.

Noodle was used to life with Murdoc, but David never could grow accustomed to his quirks.

"What are you doing out there!" David yelled one fine Saturday afternoon.

A murder of crows was gathering on the balcony. At the epicenter of the flock was the Satanist, hacking off gobbits of flesh and flinging them in the air.

"You know, 'feed the birds, tuppence a bag?'"

"There's bloody crows on the roof! People are going to think we're haunted. It'll ruin the property value. Noodle, you talk some sense into him."

Noodle didn't look up from her newspaper. "This is actually quite normal. At least he's not opening any portals to hell." A crow landed on the table and she absentmindedly poured it some tea.

David raised his hand on his forehead. "I need a drink."

"Could you get me some rum, while you're at it?"

* * *

Noodle had gone to bed at her usual hour of 10 PM. She was having a hard time willing herself to sleep however. She could hear the opening of the front door as David returned from the bar.

"What have you got there," David said in a peeved tone, "some kind of nudie magazine?"

"It's Poe. I do have some class you know."

"Sorry. I suppose I was being a bit judgemental there." Murdoc stared at David like he was a particularly truculent fungal growth on his feet.

"How did Noodle even hook up with a ponc- person like you?"

"I like to pass by this little park every morning, on my way to work. One morning, I saw her there sitting on a bench. Just sitting and staring off into space. On my lunch break, as I'm going to get a sandwich, I see her there still. When I get out of work, it's dark, and the sun's setting but she hasn't moved an inch. I was halfway back home, but it just kept bothering me. I went back, and she was still there. So, I drove her home. And that's how we met."

"She had all these weird hangups about music. She wouldn't let me play the radio. And she started crying when I got her a bag of butterscotch rounds."

"It seemed like she needed something to occupy herself with, so I got her a job. And it seemed like she was happy, or at least normal. But I don't know if I ever really connect to her."

"I want her to be happy so, so much. It's just, it feels like her past is some kind of dark hole that she clawed her way out of. And there was a part of her she lost, but I don't know what it is."

How foolish, these boys. Always trying to save her, from something she chose herself. She was absolutely content with her present life. Yes. Completely.

* * *

A standard Monday morning at work mean the standard weekly meeting. In the board room, as the boss droned on and on, people all around were doodling in the notebooks or thinking fondly of lunch. Noodle sat ramrod-straight in her chair.

"That brings us to the end of of the goals and projections meeting. Any questions?"

"Yes. I notice that in the slides, you list a combined total of £23,000,000 as the gross profits for this division, yet the sum of the compensation, maintenance, and investments only reaches £22,000,000. What about the difference?" Noodle asked pointedly.

The liver-faced man who gave the presentation turned a shade ruddier. "These numbers are not exact, there are rounding errors."

"I see." Noodle gave a small smile. The corners of her eyes were as sharp as letter openers.

As the assembled office workers left the room, people were studiously avoiding looking in Noodle's direction. Her super-soldier hearing picked up a stifled conversation.

"Well, we know who isn't getting a performance raise," whispered Meg, from Accounting.

"I'd be fired for insulting the general manager like that, but I'm not the one screwing the darling of legal," said Patty, from Sales.

"Hmph. You up for drinks tonight at the 'Ear'?"

"Sure."

Noodle was never invited to drink. But that was okay. She had a rich and fulfilling internal life and did not need outside distractions.

* * *

The mugger prowling the Westminster alleyways could hardly believe his luck when the small Asian woman wandered into the dark tunnel between buildings. She was wearing a gray business suit, carrying a designer purse, and looked completely loaded.

He could still hardly believe his luck when the woman turned around and deftly hit all the places that hurt the most. She slammed him against the wall until his nose was a bloody smear on the brick.

"You can come out now, Murdoc," Noodle said to the green-skinned man who had been tailing her home from work.

The Satanist hid his disconcertion over being discovered quite well. "Does David know that you wander through dark alleyways looking for people to beat up?"

"They deserved it. And it's none of his business."

Murdoc took out a cigarette. He had to flick the lighter a couple of times before it would light in his shaking hands. It finally caught, and he took a deep drag. Noodle was taping up the would-be muggers hand with a roll of duct tape, for the ease of the police.

"I'm glad to see that the corporate live hasn't killed your spirit. But you're wasting your talents on these stiffs in suits. What happened to taking on the world of zombie pop?"

"I grew up, and put childish things away."

* * *

One day, Noodle came home from work to find Murdoc drawing a pentagram in blood in the living room.

"Where's your boy-toy, now," Murdoc sneered. "Too busy to walk you home?"

"He's working late tonight. We have another merger and he needs to straighten out the paperwork before tomorrow."

"Better keep an eye on him, if he stays out so much."

"Unlike you, David is a decent human being. What are you doing with all this Satanist junk?"

"Relax, love, I'm not breaking any of your beloved rules. Don't you want to talk to Dents again?"

Thats right. Murdoc had a direct line straight to the afterlife. Murdoc took Noodle's hesitation as acceptance.

"Give me some of your blood, it's worth more than mine."

Murdoc set up the ritual as before. There was a feeling of anticipation, mixed with dread, in Noodle's heart.

"And who are you trying to reach?" The operator said.

"Russel Hobbes," Noodle blurted out. Murdoc looked askance at Noodle for hijacking the call.

"My logic is that if Russel is dead, we should be able to reach his soul." She had to know what had happened to him. The guilt was eating her.

"One moment please." The screen focused on a basketball court, where a large black man was playing basketball with a taller man in dreads. Russel saw the two, and dropped his ball mid dribble.

"Muds? Noodle?"

A tiny bit of hope that Noodle hadn't known she'd been cherishing crumpled.

"It looks like you did, ahh, shuffle off the mortal coil," Murdoc said.

"Yeah. Me and Del are finally reunited again." Seeing the crestfallen look on Noodle's face, he added, "I'm sorry, baby girl. But I feel like I've just been living on borrowed time, ever since the shooting."

"At least tell us where the body is. So we can pay respects, arrange a funeral, all that sappy crap."

"Sorry, but that's at the bottom of the ocean, where you ain't never going to find it. I don't need it anymore. I'm free."

The call ended.

"Cheer up. Hey, don't you want to talk to 2D? Our old buddy? Here, let me patch us in." Murdoc fiddled with the remote. The TV still remained static.

"The blasted thing must be broken. Operator, get me 2D!"

"I'm sorry. The soul you are trying to reach cannot be contacted."

"How is that even possible!"

"He has requested to be reincarnated, per his beliefs. However, he does seem to have left a note for you."

"Give it to me." A flame lit in front of them, unburning a sheet of paper that Murdoc snatched out of the air. It said, in 2D's scrawled handwriting,

"Hi Murdoc, have decided to be reborn. Heaven is nice, but it's always the same. I try to write new tunes, but everything that comes out is stuff that I've already done. I just can't think of any new music. So I'm leaving.

If you see Noodle, tell her that she still has what it takes inside her to make music. She shouldn't run from my memory so much.

I'll be back on Earth soon. Maybe we'll meet again somehow.

2D"

Murdoc stared blankly at the note. "He's gone. He's really gone."

"You can't find him again?"

"Being reincarnated is like having your soul put in a wood chipper and made into recycled newspaper. Even if I could find him, he wouldn't be the same." He rose up and kicked the TV. "He should have at least asked me about it!" It was the classic Murdoc tendency to transmute all emotions to anger.

"Like you're one to talk," Noodle said. She got up and climbed out the window.

"Where are you going?"

"To the roof." That was Noodle's private spot. She'd spent a lot of time here, in all kinds of weather. This close to London, the light pollution made it impossible to see stars, but at least she could the moon looking down at them. It was a lovely full orb tonight.

"Wait for me!" Looking down, she could see Murdoc trying to follow her. Awkwardly, he flopped out of the window. He rested his weight on a shingle not meant for a man his size, which promptly broke. Had Noodle not caught his hand just in time, he would have taken a nasty fall.

Murdoc sat down next to her. He pulled a bottle of beer from who-knows-where and too a swig.

"You know you can tell your Uncle Murdoc anything, right?" He attempted to say in a comforting manner.

"It's not that he died. It's that he left. I had plenty of money, but what was I going to do with myself?" Noodle pointed a finger at Murdoc. "And don't you go trying to worm your way into my good graces. You're back now, after running out of money, but you left too."

"Don't you know what it's like to be ghost-haunted?" Noodle continued.

"Yes, there was that incident with the Bogeyman."

"Not literal ghosts. Figurative ghosts. When 2D died, I saw him more than ever. He was in the old shirts I liked to wear, so I burned them. He was in the CDs we recorded, so I threw those out. He was in the guitar, and the sounds of music. The radio was a landmine of memories."

"And none of you were there, to help me remember or to help me forget. So, if the past was going to abandon me, I might as well abandon the past," Noodle concluded icily.

"Don't you assume that I never thought about 2D. I suppose I have a confession to make. In Thailand, in Myanmar, I used to call him a lot. It wasn't so bad when his soul was still there. But I never knew he could pull this kind of crap on me. I guess … I always figured I'd have him around, one way or another."

"Say," Murdoc said, lightening the mood, "Do you remember the time when Russel caught me trying to teach you how to shoot heroin?"

"Yes."

"He nearly broke my nose another eight times. Funny thing, you got a little spacey. What was that all about?"

"The needles reminded me of the many shots of serum the Japanese army gave me when I was being trained to be a super-soldier."

"Oh. Oh, wait, what about the time with the porcupine and the leather couch ..."

The night turned into a highlights reel of old times. Noodle managed to crack a smile when Murdoc made a bad imitation of the time 2D accidentally dialed his mother, thinking it was a phone sex line.

It was good, to be talking about 2D and Russel again. Perhaps they were more alive when their memories were being revisited. And Noodle was surprised at how much she missed talking to somebody that understood all her references, was a native to the alien world of her childhood.

After a long laughing session, Murdoc turned to her and said, "Listen, Noodle. I'm planning something big. I want to record a new album with you."

"You're not going to drag me into your craziness again."

"Look. Music is your life's blood! You and me both. You're going against your true nature, trapping yourself in a stuffy little cubicle. Leave the desk jobs to the plebs with no vision. We really can be the Gorillaz again."

Noodle considered it. What did she have to lose? She could leave her job and her co-workers would celebrate. She still had several million in the bank. And … she sort of missed being able to stay up till the witching hour in their creative jam sessions.

"Alright."

There was a scream from below.

"Huh. Guess we forgot to clean up the pentagram."

* * *

The next couple of weeks were abuzz with excitement. Noodle quit her bland, unfulfilling desk job and devoted her time to re-familiarizing herself with her guitar. When she picked up that familiar weight again, and strummed the first chord, she grinned from ear to ear. How interesting, that you can forget just how much something made you whole.

The music world had moved forward in her absence, so Noodle hastened to play catch-up. Murdoc might have been stuck on the "classics," but they needed to know the current state of the art. Not in a trend-following way though. You had to know the enemy to defeat it.

Looking back, Noodle found her obsession with reforming the state of pop music a bit idealistic. In the end, it was the internet, torrenting, and iPads with music production capabilities that had broken up the old distribution channels. The big record companies poured more and more money into coming up with canned hits, but in the end, they were simply starved out of existence.

That did make it a bit difficult to get funding for the Gorillaz though. It meant that they would have to handle their own marketing. Social media made this both easier and harder than expected. Murdoc was in his element, slinging insults at whatever puffed-up poppinjay was in the news today, and steadily leaking hints as to the new project. The album would most likely be smaller in scope than the ones before though.

Noodle sat on the kitchen table, frantically scribbling inspiration on a brown paper shopping bag. After all this sterility, her brain was filled with fertile loam, and ideas sprouted as fast as weeds on Miracle-Grow.

"Noodle, we need to talk."

"I'm listening," she lied. With her recent busyness, she had been neglecting David as of late. A half-lit cigarette was smoldering next to her and filling up the house with pungent smoke. She thought Murdoc had disabled the smoke detectors, or at least whacked them enough that they didn't work anymore.

David wrapped his arms around her from behind. "I just wanted to go over the wedding plans. We're still set for next August, right?"

Oh, right. She'd forgotten about that.

"That's not a very good time anymore. It'll be crunch time for the album."

"September?"

"Interviews, promotions. We'll want to do some touring."

"How about pushing it up to this winter, then?"

"That's when we'll actually be recording the album."

Noodle looked up, distracted. David's concerned face, so comforting before, now seemed bland and insipid. She hoped he would leave soon so she could start picking out the chords to the new song.

"You've been going out a lot lately with Mr. Niccals. You're not … sleeping with him, are you?"

"No!" The very thought of having that slimy tongue of his in her mouth made her shudder with disgust. "We're taking in the local music scene, talking up financial backers, renting a recording studio. You wouldn't understand."

"I'm worried about you, Noodle. You've quit your job, you're staying up at odd hours, and you've even started smoking again."

"Well, thanks for your concern, but I assure you that I know exactly what I'm doing. I've succeeded as a musician before, and can certainly do so again."

"Umm, there's a company party on the 23rd, and I was wondering if you'd be able to come?"

"No can do. We're meeting the frontman of the band Harlequin Monkeys to see if we can do a collaboration."

"Is there anything you want to do together? We never talk anymore."

"Perhaps because there's nothing to say."

"Sweetie?"

"I think," Noodle enunciated slowly and clearly, "that we should take a break."

* * *

Interviewer: Tell us a little bit about the latest demo you've released, Magnetic Tube.

Murdoc: For this new album, I thought I'd go and get my brain scanned, you know, for science.

Noodle: Murdoc fails to mention that he was being paid twenty pounds an hour for the privilege.

Murdoc: Anyway, they put you in a metal tube and make you lie very still. I had an itch on my balls I was dying to scratch. And the machine is loud! Almost as loud as a Metallica concert. Just a solid mass of pulsing, claustrophobic noise aimed right at your head. But when you listen to it for long enough, you start to hear layers in it. Or maybe that was the pot.

Noodle: I thought the idea of a system of sound probing the inside of your mind was very interesting. We are constantly experiencing the illusion of consciousness from the inside, but we still have difficulty analyzing it from the outside. But imagine if the music you listen to was actually a way of determining the frequency your brain works at! Or, more sinister still, if it was a way of influencing the frequency of your thoughts.

I: This question is for Noodle. What was it like growing up as part of the Gorillaz?

Noodle: In a sense, growing up in Kong was like every child's dream: no bedtime, no school, and all the toys you could want. In another sense, it was an exhausting and unpredictable nightmare. You must remember that I started touring when I was 9, which is a big ordeal for someone of any age.

Out of the three men, Russel was the one that was most like a father. He was the only one that understood any Japanese at all, and he made sure I went to bed on time and ate my vegetables. I think he wanted me to have as much of a normal childhood as possible. When I became a teenager, he gave me a big talk about how I shouldn't let 2D and Murdoc's abusive relationship color the way I think about love.

Murdoc: You make it sound like we were bent.

Noodle: 2D was more like a big-brother to me. We would sit around and play video games, and fiddle around with music. He wasn't the brightest, but we did have some very interesting conversations about freedom and reincarnation. I miss him the most.

Murdoc: Especially since we can just give Russel a call at any time if we want his beats.

Noodle: As for Murdoc …

Murdoc: What, do you want me to leave the room for this one?

Noodle: I think I'm the only person he would ever admit to liking.

Murdoc: Not today, love.

I: Questions of identity feature prominently in this new album. Would you mind talking about your inspiration for this motif?

Noodle: What does it mean to be British? What does it mean to be American? What does it mean to be Japanese? All these countries have once had sprawling empires, yet have also experienced their empires fall and new ones take their place.

We are now experiencing the dying throes of capitalism. Unemployment should mean nothing in a post-scarcity society. Isn't it something to be celebrated, that we no longer have to earn our bread by the sweat of our brow?

However, our society still bases identity on the work that you do, especially in corporate life. If we continue to cling on to this old conception of identity, we will only experience further riots and anarchy as people desperately complete for a dwindling supply of jobs. The earth is good, and can support humanity even after we abuse it so. But will humanity allow itself to be supported?

Murdoc: I don't think our grand old U of K needs more people on the dole.

* * *

"I think that interview went well," Murdoc drawled, stretching his legs in the small park outside the studio. His breath left clouds in the crisp fall air.

"You were almost kicked out for making sexist comments about the interviewers breasts," said Noodle, but not in an angry way. She was pleased that the local radio decided to pick up their story.

"Same difference." Murdoc raised the umpteenth cigarette to his mouth. No sooner had he lit the end than it was snatched out of his hands by an enterprising blue tit.

"Hey, give me that back!" The small bird flew the cancer stick up to its nest, where it proceeded to chatter at Murdoc in a presumably insulting manner. Noodle stifled a giggle at the way the infuriated Satanist stomped around the tree, even giving it a few kicks.

"That does it, I'm going up there." Murdoc grabbed the lowest-hanging branch and awkwardly tried to pull himself up, legs flailing uselessly in the air. Noodle took pity on him and boosted him up far enough for him to flop onto a limb. Step by step, he precariously made his way to the bird's nest.

"I've got you now!" He lifted the bundle of twigs in the air. Noodle could see the small bird flying circles around Murdoc's head, hoping to liberate its nest. Murdoc stood up to bat at the annoying feathered pest, windmilling his hands uselessly in the air.

Unfortunately, Cuban boots are not best suited to maintaining a firm grip on tree bark. Noodle's amusement turned to horror as Murdoc fell off the branch, plummeting towards the earth.

"Call the ambulance," Murdoc managed to say before losing consciousness.

* * *

The good news was that Murdoc suffered no serious injuries from his fall, beyond bruises and a concussion. The bad news was that an X-ray revealed several suspicious lumps in his lungs that turned out to be cancer. The worst news was that the blood tests to determine whether the cancer had metathesized revealed he was suffering from hepatic, lymphatic, renal, peinal, adrenal, and cardiovascular failure. In other words, Murdoc's organs were finally giving out.

It was a wonder that his body hadn't rebelled against its abusive master earlier. Murdoc's charts were an inch-and-a-half thick with the list of all the substances he had pumped into his body over the years. Noodle stood awkwardly on the waxed linoleum floor and listened to Murdoc talking aimlessly about everything except what was important.

"They're piping easy-listenening over the speakers all day, god-damned Coldplay and Enya. And the bloody chaplain keeps trying to visit. I should get the door warded." The exertion from his anger spawned a coughing fit that left bloody specks on the clear plastic.

"God, I need a smoke," he muttered.

"The doctor says that he's never seen tumors the size of yours. Without treatment, they say you've only got a month. Are you going to try chemotherapy?"

"Are you pulling my balls? Do you know what that stuff does to your hair? I'd rather leave a beautiful corpse, thank you very much. I guess I won't live to see the album come out though."

"Murdoc, at least treat your own death with some seriousness!"

"Oh, I am. I've had lawyers in and out to get the will squared away. I want the funeral to be big and loud. Pull in all the horses, the hearses, the bagpipes. On second thought, nix the bagpipes. Think I can get the Queen to pay a visit?"

Murdoc's dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. "Listen, Noods, I want to ask you a favor."

Noodle bent down to the bed side. "I'm listening."

"This is something that I've been wanting to do for a long time."

"Mmhm."

"I want you to keep safe and sound ..."

"Yes, go on."

"... a bag of my urine. I've pissed on my father's and my brother's grave, and I'll round out the collection by pissing on my own."

Noodle was torn between smiling and crying. The average produced a kind of grimace. Murdoc, Murdoc never changes.

"God, what am I going to do without you?" She buried her face in her hands.

"I'm sure you'll manage somehow. You're a big girl, you can handle yourself."

She looked up at him. Murdoc, never the fittest of people, looked shriveled and tired in his bed. His once prominent musculature had shrunken, with his arms now like bone in a sack of jelly. The bags under his eyes threatened to swallow up his whole face.

He grimaced from some unknown pain.

"Could you turn up the tap on the morphine?"

"How much?"

"All the way to 11." With shaking hands, Noodle did it.

The mismatched pupils dilated and his scowl relaxed into a into a beaming smile. She could see the wrinkles on his face, each line a memory. She gently patted his hair, as he started babbling again, more incoherently.

"I can't imagine how things could have turned out this way. How can I die when I'm not even real to begin with? I thought the booby prize for being manufactured was immortality. It's like the story of Gorillaz is being written by someone with the goal of bumping us off one by one for maximum tragedy."

"But I've got one last trick up my sleeve." Murdoc said dreamily. He pointed at a copy of the Tibetan Book of the Dead on the bedside table, which Noodle recognized from 2D's library. "The soul is all in the name. The devil can take his details, and shove it up his-." His head lolled back.

"See you in another life," Murdoc mouthed, and breathed his last.

* * *

After the funeral (all the human refuse of Stoke-On-Trent gathered in one place, the reactivated cyborg buries herself in her master's grave), David showed up. He sidled up shyly at Noodle's side.

"Hey. How are you holding up?"

"All right. Everything was as I expected."

"Look. I know this isn't the right time. But I got this feeling that I'd never see you again, and I knew you wouldn't be here."

"I went and looked up the Gorillaz," David continued. "There's a lot about music I don't understand. And I don't have that special bond that you shared with your family. But we still have a future! We can make it work! Please, I'm begging you."

She looked at him, the square man wearing a business suit even now. She saw a life of cocktail parties and businessmeetings. She saw maternity, retirement, and twin headstones. What a ponce, Murdoc's voice seemed to echo in her head.

"I'm sorry, David. You supported me when I was in a dark, dark time. But I'll never be able to live an ordinary life."

"Music is my first love. And, in a way, it's my only love."


	3. Omake

Note: This is not fanfic "canon"

* * *

**Omake Epilogue**

It was 2D's birthday, so Noodle decided to do visit 2D's grave. This is what you did on dead people's birthdays, right? She even got a package of his favorite Jaffa Cakes to feed the birds while she was there.

When she came to the graveyard at the foot of Kong, she saw that she wasn't the only one who had decided to pay a visit. There was a middle-aged woman sitting on the tombstone, chainsmoking. She had the rotund, stretched look of someone who had gained a lot of weight very quickly. Yet there was something familiar about her face.

When she saw Noodle, she gave a sneering smile, revealing a mouth full of buck teeth. Noodle recognized her then.

"Paula."

"Oh, if it isn't the little oriental wonder-girl. I see you staring. It's the fat, isn't it? Well, that's what happens when you take antidepressants for twenty years." She stubbed out her cigarette on the tombstone. From the many burn marks, it seemed like she had been here quite some time.

Noodle was not to be scared off by a wanna-be guitarist. She plopped herself down on a bench and threw a jaffa cake on the ground.

A blue tit came and pecked nervously at the cake. Noodle threw a few more crumbs over, and the bird seemed to gain confidence, perching on the chocolate-covered pastry like an edible couch.

However, the bird wasn't the sole possessor of such an embarrassment of riches for long. A ragged black crow flew over, and jabbed threateningly at the tinier bird. The crow tore messy chunks out of the cake, flung every which way. The blue bird pecked at the crumbs at the corner.

Then, a huge stray mastiff bounded over, startling the birds. The brown dog delicately licked up the body of the cake. Large, doleful eyes stared at Noodle. When no more food was forthcoming, it wandered off.

Paula stared at the allegorical scene with disinterest.

"I'm not sure why I'm here. Stuart wasn't the first boy I had. He wasn't even the first that died. But I guess he was very memorable."

Noodle didn't actually know very much about Paula. Murdoc had studiously avoided having any conversations about her, and 2D only blubbered on about her when he was far too intoxicated to make sense. Still, they were the only two "Gorillaz" left, and that had to count for something.

"Would you like to stop by for some coffee?" Noodle offered.

"Only if you're buying."

As Noodle crossed the street, she was promptly hit by a bus, dying instantly. Paula then used her status as the only living member of the Gorillaz to write a mediocre autobiography, which sold like hotcakes. From the proceeds, she hired a top-notch psychiatrist to fix all her mental problems and lived happily every after.

The End


End file.
